Peace
by loosedefense
Summary: Mohinder tries to move on with his life after the disappearance of the Petrelli brothers. Gen. Matt/Mohinder


It is Molly who first notices something is wrong. She tugs at Matt's sleeve one day and asks, "Why is Doctor Suresh so sad?"

Matt looks up from the news discussing the disappearance of Nathan Petrelli and the possibility of foul play when his brother Peter is found to be missing as well. "Hmm? Doctor Suresh is not sad."

He goes back to the news then, but Molly tugs again. "Yes, he _is_," she insists. "Don't you feel it?"

Actually, he hasn't been feeling much since the night he, Mohinder and Molly ran away together; mostly he's been keeping an ear out for anything that might indicate that someone is looking for them, either by watching the news or by fielding the thoughts of random people in the vicinity. Linderman may be out of commission, but they know enough of the world that the death of a powerful man does not go unperturbed for long.

As such, he hasn't been paying as much attention to Suresh as he probably should have, but he's pretty sure he would notice if Mohinder were sad.

Matt suddenly feels guilty; is Mohinder sad because Matt hasn't been paying enough attention to him? That sounds egotistical, and makes Mohinder sound like the kind of pining cheerleader girlfriend Matt had always wished he had when he was in high school, but it could be true. They are raising a child together. More specifically, they're running state to state hiding in cheap motels while looking after the sweetest little girl he's ever known because they're all freaks who will probably top the FBI's Most Wanted list if Linderman's remaining forces have anything to say about it

Maybe he needs to show Mohinder a little affection. Not _that_ way – Matt means it in the most heterosexual, manly way possible.

So after dinner, Matt spends some time pacing about his side of the room wondering how to begin this conversation with Mohinder and wondering if he should send Molly to wait outside in the hall in case it gets a little too crude in here before the cop in him slaps himself for even considering such a stupid risky option and he decides to just wing it.

He goes up to the desk Mohinder is sitting behind upon which his laptop is place and opens his mouth to say something but stops dead when he sees the expression on Mohinder's face. He's not looking at his laptop; at first Matt thinks he's looking at him, but Mohinder's looking absently at a spot next to him and doesn't seem to have even realized his friend is trying to get his attention. His eyes are contemplative, but he sees a gleam of sorrow behind them that he's never seen before.

"Mohinder?" The Indian looks up, and seems surprised to find that there are people in this room other than him. He doesn't answer, but his eyes tell Matt to say whatever it is he wants, and be quick about it, so Matt clears his throat self-consciously and pulls up the spare wooden seat.

"Listen, we need to talk."

"Molly," Mohinder calls immediately, "why don't you take your shower."

Matt chastises himself for not thinking of something so simple to get her out of the room, so he does the only thing Mohinder hasn't done and gives her a warm smile and tilts his head towards the bathroom encouragingly. She stares at them for a long moment with wide eyes then goes, not breaking her gaze until she passes them. When the door closes, Matt turns back to Mohinder.

"What?" Mohinder asks lifelessly.

Matt leans in, hoping his concern is evident on his face. "What's wrong, man?"

He holds his breath, waiting for Mohinder to do something – leap to his feet, bare his soul, cry – but all he does is shake his head a quarter of an inch to either side and ask, "What do you mean?" in that same dulled voice.

"I _mean_, look at you—" Matt exclaims, "—you come home every night looking exhausted and get on that computer of yours, you barely even look at us; I don't think I've seen you smile once since we left New York—"

"What's there to smile about?" Again it's that same emotionless tone, hut this time there's an edge daring Matt to answer.

"We saved the world," Matt reminds him gently. Mohinder shakes his head more vehemently this time.

"The _Petrellis'_ saved the world," he corrects. "And all they had to do was give themselves up for it."

Matt sighs and rubs his eyes. He knows Mohinder is having a tough time grieving; hell, they all are. But they barely knew the Petrelli brothers, and what had to be done had to be done. It was their choice after all, to fly out into the sky and die together; there was nothing left to do but move on.

"Molly!" Mohinder bellows, whipping his head in the direction of the bathroom fiercely, "Why don't I hear water running?"

There is a pause, and then both men can hear the shower hissing loudly and the sound of water continuously crashing against the floor of the bathtub. Matt turns back to face Mohinder, whose eyes are still trained on the bathroom door. "Suresh."

"What?" he snaps, turning his attention back to the former policeman. Matt is at a loss for words. "Are we done?" The part of him that's had to keep antsy suspects from bolting out the door during questioning wants to snap back, but he rears his instincts in and nods.

"Yeah, we're done."

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Mohinder never has them stay in a town longer than a week; as such, he's barely even home, because one week is a bitch of a time constraint when it comes to exhausting whole lifetimes. It's nearly impossible to find work and make enough money to pay for food and cover the bill for the motels they hop around to, but they make it work – well, Mohinder makes it work, because Matt is never allowed to be separated from Molly, and Molly is never allowed to leave the room; Mohinder spends his time from the day right after they check in out searching for work, possibly more than one job if he can, and bringing home the bacon. Matt has offered to help, pointing out that it will be easier on Mohinder if he shares the load, but Mohinder refuses every time.

And Matt is tired of it. Molly hasn't said anything since the night she urged him to find out what's bothering Suresh – after the failed attempt at getting Mohinder to talk about it, Molly had suggested that Matt read his mind, but apparently, Mohinder's been practicing clearing it out because when Matt had tried to invade it, no words had jumped out at him, only a kind of vague vision, if one could call it that, of emptiness and slight swatches of color making their presence known every once in a while, as though pressing both down against the background of Mohinder's vacant mind and up against the eye of Matt's brain. "'The mind is not a book,'" Molly had said. When Matt had asked what she meant by that, she'd replied smartly, "'The mind is not a book.' It's what Snape said to Harry when he was trying to teach him Occlumency."

"So what does that mean?" Matt admits he's succumbed to the temptation of reading the Harry Potter novels before, but he's not pathetic enough to have actually memorized lines from it. With his dyslexia, he barely had the will to get through the first three, and then the volumes started getting thicker and thicker.

"It means that if Mohinder is trying to stop you from reading his mind, he's probably got something in there he doesn't want you to hear, and it's probably got something to do with the Petrellis'. You're going to have to feel it out instead of waiting for the answer to come to you," Molly had advised.

So that's what Matt's been doing. Sometimes he thinks Mohinder can feel it, when he's trying to get into his thoughts, because he chooses the most damning moments to suddenly stare at him, effectively breaking Matt's concentration and forcing him to look somewhere else. When this happens, Matt doesn't try any funny business for at least another hour. It's slow work, and Matt has had to resort to doing most of it while Mohinder is asleep, which is pretty creepy, and Matt's never had much of an attention span anyway. The only thing that prevents him from giving up entirely is that he doubts he can live another day the way he does, and he doubts Mohinder will be able to bear it much longer either.

When a person sleeps, he loses all control of what his brain visualizes, and in Mohinder's case, he loses all control of trying to hide his brain's functions from Matt, so its easy for the other man to get into his head and see what he's seeing. Sometimes it's stuff that doesn't make sense, just random nonsense that, try as he might, Matt cannot get to fit together; sometimes it's about Mohinder's life in India, in a time before he had been dragged into this whole can of worms his father had opened; sometimes it's about a sequence of events that never took place, like New York being devastated in a blast that's enough to turn humans into corpses without a moment's notice; and sometimes it's about the Petrellis'. These are the dreams that interest Matt the most, because he knows Mohinder is still too tied up in the loss of the two men for his own good, and he wants to know just what it is about them that has the Indian whipping his own back as punishment.

It's kind of like watching television without sound. Matt can hear the words being spoken just fine of course, but it's like there's an element behind them that's been stolen. The picture comes through loud and clear, but it is incomplete in a way he does not understand.

One day, Mohinder comes home looking as though he's ready to collapse right on the spot and waves away Matt's concerns, opting instead to crawl into bed on top of the comforter with his clothes still on and an arm over his face to shield his eyes from the light of the lamp he doesn't bother to turn off. Cautiously, Matt lies back down on his own bed, where Molly is curled up beside him, and turns the TV back on. There is a new item discussing the return of Nathan Petrelli after his month-long absence. Mohinder's arm falls away from his face and he pulls himself to an upright position with wide eyes and parted lips. "Turn it up," he commands.

Matt presses on the volume button until the guests in the next room can probably hear it too, but Mohinder doesn't comment on the noise at all so Matt just leaves it. A news feed shows microphones being shoved in his face from every which way with reporters demanding to know where he's been and where his brother is, and Matt notices Mohinder's hands clench into fists when the politician just puts on an easy smile and laughs their concerns off. "Calm down," Nathan holds his hands up motioning for them to slow down. "My brother and I have just taken a little trip … upstate. It's nothing to worry about, just a little family time away from the press. My brother is there now, I'm afraid he won't be joining me for the duration of my campaign … yes, I am aware that such an extended and sudden absence has hurt my chances; I look forward to rebuilding myself to my constituents, and I look forward to earning all your votes in representing this state and, eventually, this country—"

Nathan's speech is cut short as Matt flicks the TV off with the remote. He and Molly turn almost fearfully to gaze at Mohinder. He's sitting at the edge of his bed, still staring expressionlessly at the blank TV screen, and slowly he bows his head. "I'm going to sleep," he announces, then pulls his body back to its previous position, throws the covers over himself and flicks the lights off.

Something extraordinary happens that night.

Matt pretends to go to sleep, fully aware that Mohinder is still awake simply by the fact that there is no _way_ he would actually go to bed after what they have just seen, and so he attempts to delve into the geneticist's mind again, not sure what it would yield but hoping that Mohinder is tired and pissed off enough that the walls he puts up to guard his thoughts are weak enough to break through. He doesn't actually hear any thoughts, but what he does find is incredible.

The color swatches that lie against the background that personifies emptiness are back – further proof that Mohinder is not really asleep – but this time, every time a different tint presents itself, Matt _feels_ it. He doesn't know quite how to explain it; it's as if each color assuages him with an emotion that swirls within its depths.

He sees a pink tint flash in his mind and it's as if his whole body throbs, except its limited to the inside of his head, He feels pain, nothing like the physical pain he's used to when he would get banged up on the job, but the kind of emotional pain his ex-wife always accused him of being short of, and experiencing it now the way Mohinder must, he would have to agree.

Blue. Sorrow. Fluidly all the hurt changes, transfers, into a kind of sadness that makes him feel as if all he wants to do is cry until there's nothing left, but for some reason he can't shed even the smallest tear, and oh god, it's _torture_.

Yellow. And now he's wondering what's wrong with him, what has happened that has made him, made Mohinder, so fucking cold he's no longer in touch with himself enough to even cry. It's building up inside, he knows that; his eye doesn't prickle the way Matt's known it to whenever _he_ cries, but it feels as though there is an almost tangible connection with the man on the other bed that he knows somewhere he must be feeling the tingle more intensely than Matt does; Matt knows all that he feels is only a vague shadow. The tear won't fall, and it's just ruining him because there's no relief.

Black. He's grief-stricken; if Matt had access to the words he knows for sure are swirling around in Mohinder's head, he would be able to understand the root of all his problems. If words are black like they are on paper, then they are hidden by a black veil; it's so frustrating to Matt because he knows the answer is _there_, _just_ out of reach, and the veil is too dark for him to even peek through because it blends in with the thoughts so easily he can't even distinguish the revelation from the shield that hides it from him.

Matt turns over, attempting to break the connection between Mohinder and himself. He can't do this; he's not capable. Another moment in Mohinder's shoes, and he will break.

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One week later they're in a new town. Matt doesn't even bother to remember where they are anymore, since Mohinder is obviously the leader and all he needs from Molly is to make sure Linderman's men are at bay. But it's different now because both of them are growing restless. Molly's tired of having to spend all day stuck behind four walls, and Matt thinks it's cruel to subject her to it, especially considering that she's been a prisoner for the past few months back in New York; not to mention he's not too sure he has the confidence to put his life and hers in the hands of a leader who is obviously swirling into depression. So when Mohinder comes back to their ugly room today and immediately pulls out his laptop without so much as a 'hello', Matt decides he's had enough.

"Mohinder."

Mohinder ignores him, intently writing notes down on a pad of paper he's gotten from the receptionist and occasionally squinting at the monitor he's apparently copying the information from.

"Mo."

Again, no answer. Matt presses his hands heavily against either end of the small desk.

"Suresh!"

Mohinder looks up in surprise at the tone. There are heavy bags under his eyes and he looks like he's about ready to collapse on his feet.

"What?" he turns back to hurriedly jotting down his notes.

"When are we going back to New York?"

Mohinder pauses, then slowly raises his eyes to meet Matt's. "What?" This time, his voice is confused.

"When are we going back?" Matt asks steadily.

Mohinder stares at him blankly, then slowly, as if he thinks Matt is stupid for not realizing this, tells him, "We're not going back. We can never go back to New York."

He's about to go back to his work, his mind still racing from the conversation that's been sprung on him, but anger flares up inside Matt and without thinking he grasps Mohinder's jaw tightly with one hand and forces him to look at him again. Offended, Mohinder jumps to his feet, upsetting the chair he'd been sitting on.

"Get your fucking hand off me!" he roars. Matt's glad he sent Molly to take a shower before confronting the Indian, though he hasn't heard a peep from the bathroom and is positive she's standing on the other side of the door straining her ears to catch every word. And he's pretty damn sure she heard those ones just fine.

"We are not going another mile until you tell us what the plan is," Matt says just as loudly. _"When are we going back to New York?"_

"_We're not going back to New York, you dumb fuck,"_ Mohinder raises his voice even louder. "We can _never_ go back to that place."

"_So you just want us to spend the rest of our lives this way?"_ Matt yells incredulously. It had been what he'd feared, but he had hoped that Mohinder would be smarter than that. "And you're calling _me_ the dumb fuck? _We can't live like this, Mohinder!_"

"What do you want me to do, Matt?" Mohinder shoves him. "You want me to take you back to New York? You want me to take you to where people are looking for us? _Huh?_ You want me to take us back where they can find Molly?"

No one shoves Matt and gets away with it – not unless getting back at them would mean dire consequences, like having all his attempts at graduating to detective level be sabotaged by someone other than himself for example – so he launches himself at Mohinder, whose face changes to a look of shock before they're both down on the floor, and then they're wearing identical masks of aggression, teeth baring as they roll around trying to get in as many hits on each other as possible.

"You want to take me on?" Matt hollers. He delivers a punch to Mohinder's gut, but it's not as hard as he would have liked it to be because he's pressed up right against Mohinder and the other man has a tough grip on his arms so he can hardly move them. But he's bigger and stronger – sure, Mohinder's got more muscles than he does, but Matt's still got more bulk, and seeing as how Mohinder hasn't hit the gym in months, most of those hard curves are probably melting away into soft flubber – and Matt figures they're probably equally matched in their insane rage.

Mohinder's fingers crawl up around Matt's neck, and he begins digging and clawing into the flesh. Hygienic tasks such as cutting one's nails have fallen to the wayside since they'd been on the run, so it gives him another weapon to use. "You're so … god … damn … stupid," Mohinder grunts, rolling them around so he's on top now. "I'm trying to protect you and this is how you repay me?"

Matt's struggling out of Mohinder's grip and it's only so long before they're rolling again and the cop has his hands on Mohinder's hair and pulling at it so that his head bends forward before he shoves it back to hit the carpeted ground. "This is how you're protecting us?" he snarls. "You're not running from the Company, you're running from those Petrellis'!"

At this Mohinder goes slack and loses his grip on Matt. Startled, Matt slams the geneticist's head back against the carpet one last time then pauses, still leaving his fingers in Mohinder's hair – which is greasier than Matt thought it would be even under the circumstances – just in case this is a ploy for the other man to get the upper hand.

The bathroom door flies open and Molly bursts out, still fully clothed and not a drop of water on her, screaming, "Stop it! Stop it!" The two men who'd been locked in a death glare whip their heads around to her in surprise. They pull themselves up to a standing position, not bothering to dust themselves off but instead keeping their eyes locked on Molly's big expressive ones as though waiting for her to dole out their punishment. Instead she just stares at them with glassy eyes, tears threatening to fall over.

Matt says to Mohinder, wearily but firmly, "We're not doing this anymore."

Mohinder tears his eyes away from Molly's face and Matt can see the same fear in his dark irises that had been present in Molly's. "You can't bring her back," he whispers.

Matt steals a glance at the little girl still watching them. "We'll let her decide."

Mohinder's eyebrows shoot up. _"No."_

"She's the only one who can—"

"You can't drag a child into the middle of this—"

"Molly can decide what she wants to happen in her life!" Matt turned desperate eyes on her, and Mohinder does the same. The three of them stand there in the middle of the room just staring at each other in dead silence. Molly shifts her eyes between her two new fathers.

After a long pause, she finally gets the courage to murmur, "I want to go back."

Mohinder's face crumples. He starts towards her, pleading, "Molly—", but Matt quickly intercepts, wrapping his fingers tightly around the other man's bicep, stating, "She's decided."

Mohinder doesn't try to argue. He just lets Matt go to her and looks at them as if they've betrayed him. Matt assures himself that's not the case, and places a hand on Molly's small shoulder as if to assure her of the same thing.

Mohinder turns away, and crawls into bed. His back faces them even after they pass him to get into their own bed as well.

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"Did you get a new job?" Matt questions the next morning. They're packing their bags, preparing to go to the bus station so they can buy tickets back to the City. Mohinder grunts.

"Won't they wonder why you didn't show up?" Matt tries again after an elongated period of silence.

"What are they going to do about it?" Mohinder hoists his duffel over his shoulder and exits the room.

"Do you still have your apartment?" Matt asks timidly later when they're at the bus station holding their tickets.

Mohinder had been staring blankly at the scene outside as cars roll by and people stroll around in the sun, and he doesn't look away when he responds, "It's probably not mine anymore by now."

Matt spends the bus ride wondering where they're going to stay once they get back to New York. Molly takes in the sights that pass them along, having won the coveted window seat. Mohinder slouches in the seat behind theirs and doesn't say a word.

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Mohinder's whole disposition changes when they step off the bus. While he had previously been too despondent to even shy away from the worried glances Matt and Molly shot him in the cramped bus, now he was turning his head over either shoulder every few seconds as though to make sure no one was following them, and was clutching tightly on to Molly's hand, so much so that she was squirming as discreetly as possible trying to loosen his grip. Judging by the look on her face, Matt guessed that her wriggling only served to tighten the hold Mohinder had on her.

He held the girl's other hand and together they made their way through the streets they hadn't walked on in too many months. Matt's startled to hear Mohinder's voice in his head, sounding somewhat bitter with a hint of genuine curiosity, asking, _'What do we do now, Matt?'_

"Hey, Molly," he says suddenly as they pass a pizzeria, "you want some dinner?"

"Yeah!" she gasps brightly, catching sight of the establishment. Plastering a happy grin on his face, Matt leads the other two into the small eatery.

Molly chews happily on the pepperoni with extra cheese they ordered. Mohinder doesn't move to cut himself a slice, so Matt does it for him; Mohinder ignores it in favor of folding his arms on the table and staring stoically at Matt. _'Now what?'_ his voice resounds in Matt's brain.

"Molls, why don't you go wash your hands," Matt suggests when there's only one slice left in the pan meant for Mohinder if he ever got over himself long enough to eat the one on his plate and move on to the next.

Molly pouts, apparently dissatisfied that Matt didn't think wiping her hands on the napkin isn't enough, but leaves. As she brushes past Mohinder, Matt hears his voice again – _'You're going to let her go to the bathroom alone?'_

"Oh, stop it," he snaps. "She can go to the bathroom by herself."

'_You never know who could have their eye on her.'_

"No one is watching us," Matt says lowly. "And would you stop that? It's extremely disconcerting."

'_I'm trying to do what I can to not bring attention to us, and a screaming match would do just that,'_ Mohinder's voice says quite calmly. _'Despite what you think, I actually do care about Molly.'_

"Oh, yeah, there's nothing attention grabbing about a guy having what appears to be a one-sided conversation with the man across the table who looks like he's carved of stone," Matt rolls his eyes, but checks around despite himself to make sure no one's looking their way. Nobody is.

'_Don't you think if someone were watching us, they would try to be a bit more discreet than that?'_

"Alright, enough!" Matt slams his palms against the table, then ducks his head when people _do_ turn to stare. Mohinder smirks, the first trace of liveliness on his face since their confrontation at the motel.

"Look, what are we going to do?" Matt leans forward. "If we stay in another motel tonight, I think I'm going to explode." Poor choice of words, but Mohinder doesn't show any sign of offense.

'_You were the one who brought us here. Are you saying you don't have a plan?'_

"_No, I fucking don't,"_ Matt hisses. "Alright? I'm making this up as I go along, just like you did."

'_My plan included keeping Molly safe. Yours doesn't even have that.'_

"Your plan was keeping her locked up in a dark, dirty room every day."

'_And yours is … letting her go off on her own? Speaking of which, she's been gone too long, don't you think?'_

"Shit—" Matt swears, pushing himself up as he realizes Mohinder is right. He doesn't get the chance to move away from their table, though, before he spies Molly weaving her way through the customers on her way back to them. He sits himself down slowly and shoots Mohinder a triumphant look.

'_Now what?'_

"Stop asking me that!" Molly turns her big eyes on her two adoptive dads, and Matt gives her a comforting smile, reaching out to pat her on the head. He addresses Mohinder, "We'll go back to your apartment, see what the situation is there. If it doesn't work out, we'll find some place else."

So after they pay the bill – Mohinder picks up the tab because Matt hasn't been allowed to get a job for the past month and his resources are depleted – they go to the Sureshes' apartment, but Mohinder holds back as they approach it. Matt and Molly raise their eyebrows at him.

"Matt, you go in and ask the super for me," Mohinder directs. "I'll wait here with Molly."

"Wait a minute, why do I have to go?" Matt instantly argues.

"I can't go in there! That place was a mess the last time I left it, and I haven't paid my rent since we skipped town. If I go, they'd probably force me to pay what I owe them and not even give me my deposit back. Just go in and ask for Mohinder Suresh and see what they say about the apartment, whether they've given it away."

Matt huffs in annoyance. "Fine."

Mohinder takes Molly's hand and spends the time they have together shifting his weight from one foot to the other and pointedly avoiding her gaze. He hasn't been able to look her in the eye since his row with Matt. Actually, this behavior probably started long before then, when that nagging feeling that he wasn't doing right by her began to tug more insistently at his conscience.

Matt comes out a few minutes later shaking his head disappointedly. "Your super in one angry son of a—" he breaks off when Mohinder widens his eyes warningly. "He had a few choice words to say when I asked for you; sorry, bud, they've given your place away."

Mohinder nods. "I was afraid they would. Did he happen to say what he did with all my stuff?"

"No, but I'm guessing the repo man was involved. What do we do now?"

Mohinder sighs in defeat. "I don't know," he admits. "What about your house?" The question is unnecessary, but Matt supposes Mohinder doesn't want to go on without feeling like they've exhausted all their options.

"I left my pregnant wife without a word to go gallivanting across the country with a kid and another dude. The only reason I'm even still married is because Janice's lawyers haven't been able to find me," Matt retorts. "What else?"

Mohinder stamps his foot and contorts his face in an expression of frustration. "I don't know, Matt! You were the one who wanted to come here, why am I the decision-maker?"

Matt doesn't want to get into an argument right now in the middle of the street so he holds up his hands in surrender and says, "Okay, okay, I'm sorry. But seriously, if we want to get through this, we need to pool together. Is there any place you can think of?"

"Nothing within our budget," Mohinder says glumly. "And nothing we'd be able to get on the spot." He pauses. "Well, I do have _one_ option in mind, but it will probably come to nothing..."

"Hey, not like we can do any worse, right?" Matt shrugs. "Where to?"

"Peter knew a man, a painter – Isaac Mendez. He wasn't very successful, judging by the place Peter brought me to once. I haven't seen him, and mentioning Peter's name might not get us anywhere, but … if a starving artist can find a roof over his head, maybe he'll know a place that will take us in too."

The odds stank, but at this point they were desperate enough to go through with it. "Do you know how to get there?" Matt questions. "You said Peter only brought you there once."

Mohinder gives a tight smile. "I'd be a pretty awful taxi driver if I didn't."

They're on the subway heading to Isaac's loft when Mohinder realizes he's forgotten something. "Oh yeah, he's a heroin addict."

Matt stares incredulously at him. _"What?"_

"I forgot," Mohinder says sheepishly. "It doesn't matter, we won't be staying long enough to go inside, I intend to simply ask if he knows of any places we can rent. But just to be safe, perhaps you shouldn't mention the fact that you're a cop. And keep Molly out of sight."

Matt sighs and rubs at the bridge of his nose tiredly, but decides to suck it up.

Mohinder leads them to a non-descript door and taps on it softly. "Mister Mendez?" He pauses, and when they receive no answer, he knocks again. "Mister Mendez, this is Mohinder Suresh – I'm a friend of Peter Petrelli's. May we come in?" Again no response.

Matt sighs, then bangs against the door loudly with the side of his fist. "NYPD! Open up!"

There's no answer to this either. Matt turns to Mohinder helplessly. Mohinder, on a whim, reaches out for the doorknob, and all three are surprised to find the door pushing backwards.

One step in is enough for them to recoil back out covering their noses. "Oh, jeez! What is that?" Molly exclaims.

Matt takes the lead, because he's been on the force long enough to have a horrible suspicion. He peeks into the room and finds just what he's looking for. Mohinder steps in after him, attempting to breathe through his mouth, and his eyes follow where Matt's have landed and he lets out a soft gasp.

Isaac Mendez is lying on the floor in the middle of his loft with his head sawed open and his skin rotting to bones. Mohinder's hands immediately fly to cover Molly's eyes, which does nothing more than cause her to realize whatever's in there is something she just _has_ to see. She claws at Mohinder's large palm trying to pry it away, crying out, "What? What's going on in there? Is he dead? Let me see! _Mohinder!_" She finally manages to pull his hand away from her face and rushes inside before either of her new dads can stop her. "Oh, _sick!_" she says all too gleefully when she catches sight of the corpse. Matt drags her out and slams the door shut loudly.

"What do we do?" he turns to Mohinder, who simply shrugs.

"I don't know, you're the cop. What do you normally do in cases like these?"

"In cases like these, we already know the situation before we find the body," Matt tells him. "I've never had to enter the scene of the crime without someone calling in to report it before."

Mohinder looks at him strangely. "Seriously? In all your time in New York City, the homicide cases your department has handled have only been the ones that were reported?"

"What did you expect, that we burst into houses at random checking to see if anyone had committed murder lately?" Matt shoots back.

"Well …" Mohinder looks around him anxiously as if waiting for a solution to come parading around the corner. "_We_ could report it, I suppose – I can't believe the neighbors haven't noticed anything..."

"And do what, wait for my old squad to come in and ask me why I found the guy, and why I've been out of town for the past month? They'd throw the book at us!"

"What else can we do?" Mohinder argues. "There's a dead man inside there, we have to report it—"

"With Sylar dead, there'd be no one to catch – they'd try to pin it on us. I know I said I didn't to go to another motel, but I didn't think the alternative would be a jail cell—"

"We don't have to stick around, we could just leave an anonymous tip—"

"We could stay there," Molly pipes up.

Both men break off from their frantic conversation to stare at her in disgust.

"Ew, _Molly_," Matt admonishes, his face twisted in revulsion, "we are _not_ sleeping in a room with a _corpse_."

Molly rolls her eyes. "We can get rid of the corpse," she says as if it's the most obvious thing in the world. "No one's noticed it, so no one probably cared about him enough to investigate. Why question it? This way we don't have to spend the night on the street or in prison."

Matt and Mohinder swivel their eyes from the girl to meet each other. "She gets this dementedness from you," Matt accuses.

------------------------------------------------------------------

They flat-out refuse Molly's suggestion of getting rid of Isaac's corpse and living in his old loft, finally choosing to just pretend they'd never even stepped foot into the building; now that they've explored every other option, Matt has no choice but to bite the bullet and go back to his place and beg for his wife to take him back. Mohinder promises to vouch for him should the hormones take over and she decides cooking her unofficially-former husband would be a good idea. But when Matt unlocks the door and the three of them go in, it's an empty house that greets them.

"Janice?" Matt calls, shutting the door. "Anybody home?"

Nobody answers, and Mohinder tightens his grip around Molly's hand. Matt goes to investigate and the other two slowly follow.

The last room they check is the master bedroom. Matt immediately spots a piece of paper lying on the bedside table and snatches it up. The space underneath it is perfectly clean surrounded by a perimeter of dust. He silently reads the neat cursive on the small sheet.

_Dear Matt_, it reads,_ it's been a week and I'm guessing you aren't coming home any time soon. I understand why you left. I wish we could have talked about it, but I guess there's no point to it now. I'm not going to ask you for anything, except that you don't come looking for me. I'm sorry._

"Matt?" he hears Mohinder's soft voice behind him. He turns around to see the other man standing by the door, still holding Molly's hand, both of them waiting for him to say something. Matt folds the letter and tucks it into his pocket. "Looks like we found ourselves a place to spend the night," he gives a grim smile.

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For the first time since they began their travels, Matt and Mohinder sleep in the same bed together. Matt had directed Molly to the spare room with the single bed for her use; it simply felt too weird having a child that was not his sleep on the same bed he used to share with his wife; although Mohinder was the wrong gender, at least he was an adult and possibly someone Matt could talk to, because he isn't sure how to keep the revelations of the note bottled inside. He hadn't been able to find the words, so he had simply handed Mohinder the scrap of paper to clue himself in.

Mohinder, after having read the note several times over, lowers it and turns to Matt with a serious look in his dark eyes. "I don't really know what to say," he admits.

"Neither do I," Matt responds.

"What did she mean?"

"The baby isn't mine," Matt says bluntly. Mohinder blinks. "Yeah."

"That's … that's one hell of a bombshell."

"Not really. I'd been suspecting it since she told me she was pregnant. I hoped it was mine, of course, but I can't say I'm very surprised."

"You don't seem very surprised."

"Maybe it hasn't sunk in yet," Matt shrugs. "Or maybe I don't care." He pauses. "No, I care. I just … I've only just got back, I guess. None of this seems real yet."

Mohinder places a comforting arm on Matt's chest, then quickly slides it off.

They lie down in darkness, and Matt doesn't bother searching Mohinder's mind.

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In the morning, Mohinder announces that he's going to go to Isaac's loft and call the police. Matt stares in alarm.

"You agreed to leave it alone," he accuses.

"I can't just leave his body to rot," Mohinder defends.

"Why not? It's been rotting there for weeks!"

Mohinder goes, and promises that he won't involve any of them in an investigation, and adds that it would be best for him to collect all of Isaac's paintings rather than have them taken in by the state anyway. He promises to be back in an hour or so.

Matt and Molly don't see him for the rest of the day.

When he comes back, Matt's surprised to find that he smells of alcohol.

"You went drinking?" he asks incredulously.

Mohinder shrugs. "I had to get the stench of death off me – and erase the sight of his rotting corpse while I'm at it."

Matt blinks, then leads Mohinder to the dinner table. Mohinder, however, waves away the food and goes for a shower. Matt decides to wait for him after he gets out, but Mohinder just breezes by and goes up to the master bedroom. Matt doesn't try to follow, instead having dinner with Molly and tells her that Mohinder had a hard day and needs time to himself.

When he goes up to bed himself, he find Mohinder curled under the blankets, and tries to gauge his thoughts; but all he finds is a mind at peace.


End file.
